I will have to be a little reminiscent in order to answer that. I came on my own resources at 13 years of age. I found employment in a newspaper office. After I became a journeyman mechanic and was 21 years of age I employed private tutors in mathematics, the English language, French, and German. I came into the meteorological service as a mechanic. I had the advantage of one of the best scientific libraries in the country, the largest meteorological library and the most complete in the world, and I had the association of some of the brightest minds, meteorologically, in the world, who would aid me in acquiring a modicum of education, at least, so that my study has been largely an independent one. Prof. Cleveland Abbe, of the Weather Bureau, has been a very great aid to me. Professor Hazen, now dead, taught me the better part of my mathematics, so that I have had a sort of slow growth

The CHAIRMAN. May I inquire where you came by the title of "professor?

Professor MOORE. I got the title of "professor" as the result of an examination held in 1893 by the order of the Secretary of Agriculture, who threw open to competition a professorship of meteorology in the Weather Bureau. The board of examiners that provided the examination, and held it, were a former chief of the Weather Bureau, Prof. Mark W. Harrington, at one time director of the astronomical observatory at Ann Arbor; Prof. Thomas C. Mendenhall, now president of the Polytechnic Institute of Worcester, Mass., and then Superintendent of the Coast Survey; Prof. Charles W. Dabney, president of the University of Tennessee, and Maj. H. H. C. Dunwoody, a graduate of West Point, of the army. That board held an examination, and as a result I was awarded the professorship. I had, I think, 23 competitors, most, if not all of whom, were graduates of leading universities.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you hold any scholastic degree, complimentary or otherwise?

Professor MOORE. Yes; I have two honorary degrees, one of doctor. of laws, and one of doctor of science, and I am a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The CHAIRMAN. From what institutions?

Professor MOORE. LL. D. of Norwich University at Northfield, Vt., and Sc. D. of the St. Lawrence University, of Canton, N. Y.; both small institutions, but of old and reputable standing. I think there is a member of the board of trustees in one of these institutions on this committee.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you ever given lectures before scientific institutions?

Professor MOORE. Before I answer that, I would like to make my other answer more complete. You asked me what recognition I had received from other scientific institutions. I will say I am an honorary member of the Austrian Meteorological Society, an honorary member of the Royal Meteorological Society of Great Britain, and I have just completed five yearly terms as president of the National Geographic Society-that is, of five yearly periods-and have been four years a vice-president of the Washington Academy of Science. I am editor of technical meteorological terms for the Standard Dictionary, author of the chapter on "Climate" in the Encyclopedia

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Americana, and of a college text-book on descriptive meteorology now in the Appleton's press and soon to be issued.

I seem to be compelled to make this statement by the inquiries that have been made, and therefore I think that I will be pardoned for what might otherwise seem to be a personal description, possibly an immodest one.

In answer to your last question, Mr. Chairman, I will say that by request of the following institutions I have lectured under their auspices on meteorological subjects: Yale University, Columbia University, Chicago University, Johns Hopkins University, Georgetown University, the Catholic University of America, Norwich University, St. Lawrence University, and many other educational institutions. The CHAIRMAN. I think it is of interest to the committee to know. That is the reason why I asked whether you have ever given any lectures before scientific institutions.

Professor MOORE. Mr. Chairman, I will interject a little statement, if you will permit me. I notice in reading the testimony of Professor Roth, professor at Ann Harbor, Mich., that when asked his opinion with regard to my personal attainments his answer was this: Not by a long shot. Not by a mile square."

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Mr. LEVER. Mr. Chairman, I am curious to know how it happens that Professor Moore knows about this quotation.

The CHAIRMAN. He had a copy of the hearings.

Mr. LEVER. Professor Moore had a copy of the hearings?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes; Professor Moore had a copy of the hearings. Mr. LEVER. I have been trying to get a copy all along the line, and could not do it.

The CHAIRMAN. I am responsible for that, of course, because Professor Moore, when invited to come here, naturally wanted to know what had been said. They are not printed.

Mr. LAMB. They ought to be printed, certainly.

The CHAIRMAN. He was given a typewritten copy in order that he might know what was said in relation to his report.

Mr. RUCKER. I agree that it was highly proper for Professor Moore to have a copy of that record.

Mr. STANLEY. Yes; it was only a matter of justice to him.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, Professor Moore, you may proceed, and make any statement you desire to make.

Professor MOORE. I have only to say with regard to this answer of Professor Roth that it might not be germane, but still it may be. I would criticise his rhetoric as a professor at Ann Arbor University. A little further on, when asked if he is an expert in forestry he makes the answer, "I certainly am," if I read the testimony correctly; and still further on in his testimony his attention is called to some report of Prof. Bailey Willis, to which I had referred in my report on floods, and, noticing that my first name was Willis, he said facetiously, "There is too much Willis in this report."

I would answer by saying that possibly there were too many facts and statistics in that report for Mr. Roth.

I further notice that in his entire answer and testimony before this committee he did not answer one single fact that was substantiated in my report by data. He did not bring to this committee statistics.

I wish to present to the committee a brief summary, and I will not take long in the doing of it. Now

Mr. MCLAUGHLIN. Professor, did you notice there the statement of the chairman to the effect that Professor Roth's time was very limited? The committee here knew it, and it might be well enough to have it go into the record that he was hurried, and spoke very rapidly, and regretted that he had not more time. When you speak of his rhetoric you know that he is of German birth, and does not use the English language as well as the native-born.

Professor MoORE. That may be so. But I do not think it is necessary for me to qualify my answer in any way because of that fact. Now I will proceed, if you will permít me, in making a brief summary of what I believe my report statistically shows, which is this: I have shown that the average height of the Ohio River, taking Cincinnati as a central station-the average height for thirty-eight years, taking the exact gauge readings the exact height that the water stood each day in those thirty-eight years for the first nineteen years and for the last nineteen-that the average height of the river has not materially changed. Then, studying that fact in connection with the record of precipitation made at several rainfall stations, we find that the slight variation in the flow of the river is in proper accord with the slight variation in the precipitation, it being a mere fraction greater for the latter period. I have then taken all the four wet months for the thirty-eight-year period, and all the four dry months, and I have established the average low water for the entire period and the average high water. Then I have divided the period into two parts, and I do not find that there is any material change in the average high water or the average low water, except that what variation there is is slightly less high water and slightly greater low water. I am now giving you things that, statistically, I think, my report shows clearly; and third, and I think most important for this discussion, that the number of days during a period of twenty-eight years you will notice I am taking twenty-eight years now, and not thirty-eight years, because I am only picking a period for which we have good clean records, not open to objection-that, during a period of twenty-eight years, the number of days the river at one point on the Tennessee, two on the Cumberland, and five on the Ohio stood above the danger mark, in other words stood at flood or above, was without question markedly less in the last half of that period than in the first half.

Now, I do not know to what you may attribute that, but

Mr. STANLEY. May I ask you a question right there? It may be a misapprehension of mine. You will know more about it than I. Did your investigation go into the question of the number of days when the river was navigable in the earlier and later periods?

Professor MOORE. No, sir. I have not considered whether at any of these stages the river was navigable or not.

Now, I do not want to lose the continuity of my statement, and I

Mr. LEVER. Mr. Chairman, will you allow Professor Moore to complete his statement first or will you permit us to ask questions now? The CHAIRMAN. I think it would expedite the hearing to let him go on without interruption.

Professor MOORE. The point to which I would direct attention is this: That in the testimony of Professor Roth-and in that I would include Professor Swain and that of two or three gentlemen whose

names I do not remember-that none of them criticises the data that I have used in my report to show these three important facts in this controversy, namely, that the average flow of the Ohio River, as determined by its height, has not changed; that the average high water and the average low water have not markedly changed; and that what change there is is beneficial; that the actual number of flood days is less in the last period than in the first. They did not attack those fundamental data. They gave you their individual opinions. One of them-I think it was Professor Glenn, if I remember his testimony correctly, and if I do not state it correctly you gentlemen will remember it and correct me said if I had spent sufficient time in the field I would not entertain the opinions that I do. He said he had spent four years in the field, observing the operation of the rainfall on the watersheds and the gathering of the water in the main streams. I would answer that and say I have spent over a third of a century every day in watching the fall of rain on the various watersheds and its gathering into the tributaries and its moving from the tributaries to the main streams. My duties have compelled me for a third of a century to watch this problem. Professor Glenn does not produce a single rainfall reading made during those four years or a single stream-gauge reading. If he had, I would say that four years are entirely too short to reach an opinion of any value in this problem, and it is a great problem. It is one that may influence the American people in the founding of an economic system that will mean a great deal to this nation.

I certainly can have no motive in coming here, except to do my best to get the truth before this committee, and I do not hesitate to say here that there has been much loose talk; there has been a great amount of material publish to influence the opinion of the American people that I say is fundamentally wrong, that is almost malicious in its results. This problem, which requires many years to settle, has very glibly been settled by a number of investigators who have walked up to the Weather Bureau and taken our records on rainfall and precipitation for a few years and examined only fourteen or nineteen years' data, or some other short period, and from such insufficient data-within which one abnormal rainfall might destroy the value of any fundamental deductions as to a change in flood frequency or intensity they have gone out before the public seriously and confidently with the air and mien of scientific men and said, "This problem is practically settled. There is no question at all but that the flow of streams is positively controlled by the forests."

I do not hesitate to say to you, gentlemen of the committee, what I said before the Conservation Commission nearly two years ago, and I would make it plain to this committee that my position was stated a long time ago when I appeared before the Conservation Commission, but that not one word of my opinion appeared in the conservation report, and not one word of it was given to the press. I there took issue with Mr. Leighton's paper in which he showed such an alarming increase in the floods of the Ohio Valley as to almost startle one. I took issue with his reports, there, in the presence of that commission. I have tried repeatedly to get a copy of my statements, but I have never succeeded in getting them or in seeing them in print.

I simply make this statement to show that my position began early in regard to this problem, and I am glad of the opportunity to come

before this committee. I do not come hesitatingly. I come willingly. I come in the cause of truth, and I am willing to defend my position indefinitely.

Now, if I may continue, with your permission, I would like to introduce a few comments that I have received with regard to my report.

The CHAIRMAN. Professor, before that, although they would be very interesting—before you proceed to that-I would like to have you explain to the committee in just what way, according to your estimate of the data, the Leighton report is faulty.

Professor MOORE. It is fundamentally faulty in this, that Mr. Leighton took, for a flood stage at all of the stations whose records he discussed, a reading far below the flood stage. Now, as an illustration, at Wheeling, W. Va., he took a stage of 20 feet, and counted the number of 20-foot stages, and recorded them as floods. Now, it is a fact a simple fact about which there is no dispute that the river is not in flood at Wheeling, W. Va., until it reaches 36 feet. Therefore, Mr. Leighton's paper was one in which he was discussing only moderate stream flow, instead of actually discussing floods. Again, in order to show the relation of precipitation to floods, he divided the number of days that this imaginary flood stage was reached by the annual precipitation. I do not wish to appear facetious, and with all seriousness, I will say that the annual precipitation divided into the number of days of some imaginary flood, or of some real flood, even, has as much relation to the flood intensity as has the price of eggs in Boston, and no more.

Those are two fundamental objections that I would make to his report. But I wish to say that I think Mr. Leighton was honest in his investigation; I simply differ from him in calling a moderate height of the river a "flood stage."

The CHAIRMAN. Proceed, then, Professor, and make the statement you were beginning in reference to the comments upon your report. Professor MOORE. Oh; I have finished my reference to that.

The CHAIRMAN. You were just about to refer to comments upon your report.

Professor MOORE. Oh, yes. I have received this communication, which I think will interest the committee, from Mr. Freeman F. Burr, science teacher, state normal school, New Haven, Conn.:

Prof. WILLIS L. MOORE,

STATE NORMAL SCHOOL, New Haven, Conn., February 17, 1910.

Chief of the United States Weather Bureau. DEAR SIR: Your report on the Influences of Forests on Climate and on Floods has recently come to me, and I have taken great pleasure in reading it.

The idea that forests could influence weather conditions to such an extent as to produce an important effect on rainfall has never appealed to me; but I have accepted as sensible and admitting of proof the idea that forests exert a decided influence on the run-off, in large measure controlling stream flow and preventing floods. Your arguments, however, backed as they are by seemingly indisputable data, are very convincing to the contrary.

As you say, there are plenty of other reasons why our forests should be economically dealt with; and it certainly will not hurt the cause of forest conservation if we are somewhat chary in the use of an argument which is at best of debatable value.

In connection with some of the small streams about here, flood conditions prevailed in the early part of this winter largely because of heavy rainfall after